


Two Stories

by deltachye



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Long-Distance Relationship, Reader-Insert, Romance, Skype, Song Lyrics, i was never that big of a war criminal stan but he's fun to write for, text logs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-04
Updated: 2020-09-01
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:00:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 13,537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21674080
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deltachye/pseuds/deltachye
Summary: [reader x tooru oikawa, college, long distance]your face is in my dreams; but in reality, so far.
Relationships: Oikawa Tooru/Reader
Comments: 71
Kudos: 463





	1. Wished Upon Each Star

****

**i've wished upon each star…**

The both of you ended up liking each other much more than originally planned, and that kind of just screwed everything up from there.

It’s not like either of you had meant to be mean about it, like, _can’t wait for our relationship’s expiry date!_ But it’s high school, and nobody in high school is nearly mature enough to be thinking about forever. Hell, you’ve barely got it together enough just to be thinking about tomorrow. Dating the Pretty Boy was just going to be for fun. Something to make memories out of. Maybe you’d get your heart broken young and you’ll have a funny story to share for the next person you meet, who might really be the one. You’d learn from it and grow and move on.

It’s too bad that whenever he says, _“I love you, [Name],”_ you can no longer imagine what it’s like to not feel the same way back.

You can’t even think about saying _“I don’t love you anymore, Tooru!”_ without feeling sick to your stomach. You can’t think about what it’s like not to have your heartbeat skyrocket when he touches you. You can’t think about what it’s like not to have him on your mind every hour of the waking day; and what it’s like not to dream about him. It’s bad—you’re in love. You’re _deep_ in love, and he loves you back, and that’s really mucking things up for the both of you.

It wasn’t a quick, easy process. At first you were insecure about it; obviously, you would be. He’s Tooru Oikawa for God’s sake—volleyball god of Seijoh—and you’re… who? Some girl in first year chemistry who was too shy to talk to him until second year. It was slight of chance that you were even able to talk to him. Would anything have happened between you two if you hadn’t sat behind him and been assigned his lab partner? Would anything have sparked if you’d never been forced to meet those perfectly balanced chestnut brown eyes? Would he ever even know your name if it wasn’t for dumb _luck_? Worst of all, would he ever love you? Because you think that no matter what, you were doomed to love _him_ —the one who complains; whines off your ear; sends you good morning texts; is so infuriatingly attractive it hurts.

His head’s heavy in your lap, your fingers tracing the curls he works so hard to tame in the early morning. The both of you haven’t talked in a while, but it hung heavily in the air, blown around by your creaky ceiling fan. It feels like a million ticks had gone by when he shifts—and yet, a million’s not enough. His dark eyelashes fluttered open and you watched his pupils dilate, the black edges twitching frantically against the honey brown when he meets your gaze. He sighed through his nose.

“I’m going to Argentina.”

The soft words punched you hard in your gut and your heart collapsed right into the floor. You’re a rational person (mostly), and you’d expected this. You and he had both seen it coming ever since getting together after the seventh (and a half, you insisted) date. But the irrational part of you had hoped so desperately that he’d change his mind by the millionth tick. That he’d choose you over volleyball, and everything could keep going the way it was going. You could keep going to games, camouflaged by the rest of his weird fan club; but he’d see you right away with a knowing wink and blow a kiss up your way from the court. You’d keep running down to the gyms after he won a match and excitedly kiss him while he’s hot with sweat and euphoria. He’d grab you by the waist and spin you around in front of his team, who’d try to hide their smiles behind annoyed faces. And if he lost, you’d hold him to your chest, away from the world’s watching eyes while he cried. You’d keep going on those café dates, those fancy dinner dates, those movie dates, those arcade dates, those museum dates, those do-nothing-but-walk-around-and-look-at-things dates… anything as long as he was here with you.

You don’t ask him to stay. You can’t. Thinking about it, you can daydream about the possibilities of him saying yes all you want. But you love him too much to be selfish like that. So, you scraped up the pieces of your broken heart into loose fingers and asked, flatly,

“So, are we over?”

He pressed his lips together and rose from your lap, sitting up straight in front of you with a bowed head. It was clear that he’d also been expecting it, but it was hitting harder than he could’ve ever imagined. You can’t bear to look at him, because then you might cry, and that’s a whole other mess you do not want to deal with right now.

“I want to try,” he muttered after a while, his voice hoarse with an uncharacteristic unsureness. You’re taken aback and steal a glance at his face, holding your breath. He’s still staring at his legs, hair obscuring his countenance.

“What?” you prompt, chest tight.

“We should at least try.” Tooru looked up and reached out for your hand. Instinctively, you laced your smaller fingers into his. His entire palm was rough with years of sport, but it held a gentle warmth that seeped into your shell-shock cold fingertips. “I don’t want to give up on us without giving it a shot.”

Airports are gateways into other dimensions where time is fluid, and everything is off kilter. Nothing feels quite real as you dazedly watch Tooru hug his mom and dad. Takeru’s crying, hugging Tooru’s knees. His older sister scolded him for it, but Tooru waved her off and gave Takeru a hard enough noogie to settle him down. When it’s your turn, you feel like you’re about to faint as you shuffle forwards.

You’d like to say you’re going to be okay, shipping your boyfriend off to another continent on the other side of the world. You’ve been okay alone so far, when he needs to practice for tournaments. But this is different. When he’s gone, you know he’ll be back in a week’s time. It’s a few days, but then that goofy smile comes right back to you. Now you don’t know when he’s coming back home—if ever. It slams over you like tidal waves and you’re crying before he can even touch you.

“Aw, [Name]… come on now, you don’t want to look all puffy for our goodbye selfie, do you?”

He hugged you tightly, his large hand resting on the back of your head and tucking it into his chest. You felt bad for weeping snottily into the front of his shirt, and for breaking down in front of his family, but you can’t help it. It’s finally settling in that you’re saying goodbye. He’s _leaving_.

“We can make it happen,” he breathed atop your head, in a voice only meant for you. It’s serious and makes you hold your breath. “You and I.”

“Okay,” you sniffled, trying to pull yourself together. You leant back and wiped your cheeks furiously with the heels of your palms. Sucking in the rest of it, you clenched your teeth and blinked through your tears to get your last glimpse of his face up close. His smile looked kind of weary, eyes kind of shiny, and you could tell he was holding back tears of his own.

“Love you, [Name].” He held a loose pinky out. With the hand that’s not drying tears from your face, you linked your pinky around his.

“I love you too, Tooru.”

He finally left to pass security, waving all the way. When he disappears into the sea of people, you put your arm down, resting your hand over top your chest to feel your heartbeat. All the questions you wanted to ask tumble through the emotional dam into the front of your mind. Will you forget about me? Will you fall out of love with me? Will I fall out of love with you? Will you find somebody else to love? Will I?

It hurts so much to have everything hinge on a pinky-promise and some iridescent stardust, but it’s all you have.

**…wonder where you are.**


	2. [ i've waited oh so long ]

If you had a dollar for every pixel, you’d have a whole of 25 cents.

“You’re lagging, Tooru,” you sigh, though you doubt it’ll go through any better on his end than it is for you. The screen’s still frozen on a blur, silent until a sudden garble that sounds like _hafnljnanja_ rushes through. You hang up, and his text bubble pops up shortly after.

**Pooru** : is it my wifi or urs???

You call again, getting frustrated. It’s the fifth time you’ve tried reconnecting with his video tonight. If it was anybody else, you’d have already gone to bed; but it’s your boyfriend, and as cheesy as you know you’re being, you can’t stand the thought of falling asleep without hearing his voice and seeing his face first. He picks up on the first ring, and you’re both equally surprised to actually be able to see each other’s faces.

“Hello?” he asks skeptically, tilting his head to see if you can see.

“Hey!” you reply, embarrassingly eagerly, scrambling up to sit. “It’s working better now, I think.”

He beams, and you can feel your heart kick up a fuss when you register it in your head. The video chat’s 480p at most, but his smile always makes you feel so many things, all at once.

“I can finally show you my room. You ready?”

You curl up in your bed and nod, giving an affirmed _mhm_. He switches the camera around, showing you a tiny looking desk that’s still got some unmarked boxes on it. He spins around slowly on the spot, showing you two bunkbeds; the room looks to be for four. It’s a tiny space, even by Japanese standards. Nobody else is there, so he talks loudly and freely—though he’d probably be just as obnoxious if his roomies were there anyways.

“Ta-da! Ugh. It’s cramped, isn’t it?” He’s apparently got the bottom bunk, collapsing into it while holding his phone over his face. It’s day over there, so it’s bright, which blinds you in your dark room. Squinting blearily at him, you laugh quietly.

“Yeah. I have to share you with three other guys.”

“Aw, are you getting jealous? Over me? You’re cute.”

The compliment makes you pull your blanket up to your nose so that he can’t see the goofy grin spread across your lips. He notices and pouts, knitting his brows together.

“C’mon, [Name]! I can’t see you. Don’t you miss me?”

“That’s the point,” you retort, voice muffled. “And no. I’m just thinking about how much hotter those Argentinian guys are. You don’t stand a chance, Stinky.”

He snorts, already a master at seeing through your sarcasm. “You’re such a supportive girlfriend.”

“Yes, I know. You’re so lucky… to have me!” You yawn halfway through and see him blink through his glasses at you. Apparently, he hadn’t unpacked his contacts, and you’re secretly glad for it. He hates wearing them, but you think they’re cute. It gives him a softer look that he doesn’t really show as often, so it feels all the more special to see.

“Well. Anyways.” He rubs his eyes underneath his frames, pulling the hand back up through his hair, exposing his forehead. Even though it’s daytime over there, he looks exhausted. “When does school start for you?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Oh. I guess I should let you go to bed then.” The phone captures every rustle and deafens you with static as he rolls over onto his side. He props his phone up on its side. If you ignore the blue light straining your eyes, the rainbow effect of the LED lights, the shitty quality, and the fact that Tooru’s in a whole different continent—it’s like you and him are lying in bed together, drowsily about to nap.

“I don’t want to hang up,” you admit, ashamed for it because you know he thrives off of you caving into gooey shit like this. As expected, he lights up with one of his stupid smirks that makes his eyes shrink devilishly. 

“Then how about I stay on the line until you fall asleep? That way you actually have to go to bed, or else I’ll know.”

“What would you do about it?” you ask testily. “It’s not like you can make me pass out.”

“I guess… but I’ll be really sad, and that’ll make you feel bad. So ha.” To exaggerate he gives you a great big frown. It makes you smile, and his own face softens when he sees it. You can see your own reflection off his lens.

“Okay. Here I go. Off to sleep. _Snooooooze_.” You squeeze your eyes shut, trying to be funny. It’s kind of weird, after all, to leave a line open while trying to get in your eight hours of sleep. Humour’s your coping mechanism. What’s he going to do… watch you sleep? 

“What, you don’t even want your good night kiss?”

You re-open your eyes. Tooru’s smile is surprisingly gentle, a total lack of smugness making it look almost strange. Your heart chokes you in your throat and you swallow instinctively.

“You want me to kiss the screen or something?”

“Why not?”

“What—no, I’m not doing that. That’s weird.”

“Here, I’ll do it first. _Muaaaaaaaaah_!” Tooru brings the phone to his face, and as promised, you watch his lips cover the lens of his phone. The blur of black is accompanied with a weird rustly-sucky noise that makes you cringe. You can’t help but laugh at him when he pulls back.

“If you don’t kiss me, you don’t love me, [Name]!” he whines when you finally stop giggling. You exhale sharply.

“None of your roommates are there?” you ask suspiciously. He perks up.

“Nope. Just you and me, babe.”

The pet name spreads warmth through your chest. With a loud groan to show him you’re not happy, you lean over and kiss your laptop screen. It’s cold, and smooth, the way laptop screens are—but you close your eyes and imagine him anyways. You imagine his body, placing your hand on his firm torso as you lean up on tip-toes to reach his stupidly tall face. You imagine your other hand pulling through his coarse hair, playing with the ends as he deepens the kiss. You imagine the taste of his lips between yours, something you’re already beginning to forget. You imagine _him_.

“Good night, darling,” he whispers, tone suddenly muted and sombre. You pull back and stare at him as he stares at you. It doesn’t have to be said, but the two of you are thinking it:

_It’s not enough._

“Good night.”

You roll away from your laptop screen and close your eyes, seeing him burnt into the back of your retinas anyways. You hate this. You hate that this is long-distance, and you already feel so shitty in the first week. How are you going to cope like this for the months— _years_ to come? It’s not like Tooru’s going to change his mind and drop his volleyball career to come back to Japan any time soon. And it’s not like you’re going to drop everything you’ve worked for and known to move to Argentina, especially for your high school sweetheart. So, is that it? Is this it? Does that just mean it’ll end _eventually_ if not now?

“Hey, Tooru?” you blurt out suddenly, too scared to face the screen.

“Yeah?”

“…I love you.”

Although he’s a romantic and a flirt, the two of you don’t really drop that word that often. _That’s_ something more than just teasing and touching. The Japanese know it well and respect it the way it should be. _Love._ That’s the thing that holds people together through space and time. Saves people. Love ascends logic and all known matter. Do you really have love right now, or is it just blown out infatuation? Are you going to love him a week from now? A decade from now? You don’t know. But you say it anyways, because _right_ now—in this moment, at 2:33 AM in your bed while your boyfriend’s all the way in another goddamn hemisphere—you love Oikawa Tooru.

“[Name]…” He’s thinking about making fun of you, you can tell—but he drops it. Maybe he’s smiling right now, or hiding his face, or frowning. You’ll never know. But he says it back, just as softly,

“I love you too.”

When you wake up, your laptop’s burning hot from being plugged in all night. The fan’s whirring angrily. You turn the alarm off on your phone, clicking the snooze button. Rolling over, you squint at the screen—and to your surprise, the call lasted throughout the whole night. 5 hours logged. You look at the window and see darkness; his video had shut off. But he’s still there, right? You crank your volume up and close your eyes to listen… a breath.

“[Name]-chan, your stupid alarm’s so loud,” he mutters all of the sudden, making you jump. His video’s still off, so his phone must be tucked in under his pillow or something. But he’s still there.

Hope. It’s a hard thing to trust in. It’s a hard thing to believe in something you can’t hold. You can’t hold him right now, but you can still feel him. And it helps you hope.


	3. — GIRL YOU'VE BEEN ON MY MIND EVER SINCE I MET YOU —

It’s almost embarrassing how many things remind him of [Name]. 

He’d see a tree bent in a weird way, and it’d remind him of that one weirdly bent tree he and her would walk past on one of their dates downtown. He’d see a couple sitting together on a bench as they waited for a bus and it’d remind him of when he and her would huddle together in the winter, cursing out public transportation as they shared a scarf together. He’d see a food he remembered her liking in a shop window and think of her smile while she ate it, crumbs falling down the front of her school uniform. He’d see a cloud drifting across the sky and he’d think of her hurriedly taking her phone out to take a picture of it. A song would come up on his running playlist and he’d think of her, humming along to it when she thought he wasn’t paying attention.

Was it ever going to get easier?

At first, everything had been so exciting and new. Adrenaline and hope coursed through him. His roommates were interested in him, a foreigner—his Spanish was trash, their Japanese was non-existent, and English was only just decent between the four, but the group had bonded over the same love of card games. They stayed up until ungodly hours of the night playing poker and speed and Egyptian Ratsky and war and old maid. For a while, everything was going really well. He went to classes and struggled through the language barrier. He went to meals and tried new foods, getting laughed at for making weird faces at the entirely new flavour compositions and textures. He went to practice and relished in the feeling of playing with a new crowd of elites. 

Then he went home… and he got into bed… and he lay there and did nothing but miss her.

They texted a lot, but she had school too, and the time zone was a huge chasm. Opposite worlds. He’d send her things on Instagram, and she’d like them, and send him things that he’d double tap too. They’d play games on different messenger apps together. But it was obvious as the semester progressed that she was getting busier and busier, and as the number of read receipts went up, had less and less time to talk. It wasn’t any different for him, especially as games in the league started up—though he’d gladly text under the table in lectures or stay up until sunrise on school days or game days just to talk to her.

He had a Snapchat, and although he got plenty of thirst snaps and random unsolicited ones too, he only really used it to update his story and talk to [Name] or his close friends. Makki had just snapped him a blurry picture of his shoe with the caption “not much”—Tooru racked his brain to remember what they’d been talking about. It was either how things were going or how much shipping costs were from South America to Japan. Tooru sent a half-picture of his face with the text “???”. 

He pulled down to refresh his feed, seeing a bunch of new snaps file in, as usual. He didn’t really bother opening them. Then his brows knitted together. He only had one streak, because he didn’t care about keeping up with trivial things like that when so many people were trying to network with him—and there was an hourglass.

He sent **💕 [Name] 💕** a picture of his face with the dog filter and an exaggerated pout with the text “missing you”. Without having to open the World Clock app on his phone, he knew it was only 11:38 PM for her, and she wasn’t the type to sleep early even on school days. That girl would stay up until 5 watching stupid YouTube videos if nobody stopped her. He refreshed Snapchat again. Nothing from her. The hourglass remained, ominous beside the fire emoji. 

Would it be too pushy to call her and check on her? They hadn’t called in a while, despite video chatting almost every night when he’d first moved in. He was aware of the fact that it wasn’t that big of a deal. But they’d had this streak ever since… had it been second year? Second year of high school. The number was nearing 1200. They hadn’t meant to start a streak, but it’d just happened because they’d snapped every day. He remembered her sending him pictures of her forehead, and as they got closer and closer, she’d send him actual pictures of her gorgeous face. He’d screenshot every single one, which embarrassed her—but he couldn’t help it. She was his world. Even if his world was the moon now; far, distant, and out of reach.

His phone buzzed in his hand and woke him up. He had set special notification styles for each person. His mom had one, as did his dad, and his sister and nephew too. [Name] had a particularly frantic style. When had he fallen asleep? He hadn’t even taken his contacts out and his eyes burnt furiously as he sat up, trying his hardest to see through the pain.

**💕 [Name] 💕 is typing…  
💕 [Name] 💕: omg i broke our streak……… i was at a party and forgot :(((( im so sorry tooru :,((  
You: it’s ok, nbd**

It was a big deal. With a heavy heart he went back to the main screen… no number. Those numbers had represented nearly all the days they’d been together. It was gone now. Her name was just as blank as everybody else’s underneath.

Yes, he could’ve emailed the headquarters and demand it back due to a bug. But wasn’t that too excessive? It was over now. No biggie. They could start again, but it’d be another thousand some days before they could get back to where they had been. 

**You: whose party were u at that was so fun you forgot about me >:(  
💕 [Name] 💕: :(((((   
💕 [Name] 💕: you wouldn’t know them. i just got home  
💕 [Name] 💕: don’t you have class now?? 1pm**

Japan was 12 hours ahead of him, so she was living in his future, and he was in her past. It was fitting. She was moving on well, wasn’t she? Aspiring in school and her career… and here he was, clinging to memories of what has been. Clinging to the ever-painful memory that he had never once visited Japanese high school nationals and was off chasing dreams somewhere else because he just wasn’t good enough for home. Clinging to a streak on an app as if it’d make up for the fact that his girlfriend lived so, so far away from him, and very well may move on with her life without him.

**You: im probably gonna skip  
💕 [Name] 💕: >:( no you aren’t. go to class! im going to bed  
You: but i wanna talk to u..  
💕 [Name] 💕: next time, im drunk…(SHhh) gonna pass out… good night. tell me how class was**

He watched her Bitmoji disappear right after. It was stupid of him, but he put his phone to his chest and did his best not to cry. He wasn’t a crybaby type of person, but _fuck_. There was just no cure to homesickness and loneliness besides her, and she wasn’t here.


	4. [ to call you my own ]

“Which eyeshadow colours should I use?”

“Uh… I can’t see. Move it back.”

You obliged, tilting and moving the palette backwards, trying to fit all the pans in view. It blocked your view of Tooru’s face, but you could bet real money he was squinting at them like an old man through his glasses.

“Hm… the pink one.”

“Which pink one?” you demanded exasperatedly, looking down at your palette. “There’s like, six pinks here.”

“The light pink one. Like, the peachy one. Hold it up again?”

“This one?” you asked, pointing at one blindly with the back end of your brush.

“No, the one over—no—yeah! That one.”

“This one’s a glitter shade. Are you sure it goes with my outfit? Won’t it be too much?”

“It’s cute. I liked when you wore that one. It was sparkly.”

“You remember?” you asked, surprised as you set the palette onto your lap. He shrugged, looking back down at his notebooks that he’d spread out on his desk.

“Of course I do.”

“Tooru, y—”

“Oi Tou, _¿Quieres ir a algún lugar?_ ”

You shut up, knowing that his roommates were home. Even though Tooru had his earbuds in, you felt self-conscious about talking whenever there were other people around. Tooru looked up, glancing back at the tall, tan guy standing behind him.

“ _Hoy no._ ”

“Ah!” The guy exclaimed excitedly, stepping forwards and leaning over Tooru’s seat. He grinned at you, pointing like you were a neat animal at the zoo. “ _¿Amiga?_ ”

“ _Novia!_ ” Tooru shook his head and then smiled wryly at you. “[Name]-chan, say hi.”

“O-oh, uh—hello. _¿Hola_?” You waved awkwardly. You currently had your hair clipped up, sitting on the toilet in ugly PJs with half of your make-up done. The guy whistled at you, and you immediately felt yourself blush—hopefully it wouldn’t show on screen.

“Konnichiwa. _Estas bella_.” He winked. Tooru pushed him off, scowling.

“Go already!” he complained in English, punching the guy in the ribs. His roommate laughed, dodging it adeptly. He waved at you.

“Bye [Name]!”

A door slammed. Tooru sighed and turned back to you.

“So… that was Alvaro. He’s the one I told you about. Don’t mind him; he’s the player type, obviously.”

“He seems friendly.”

“Oh yeah,” Tooru muttered, spinning his pencil on his thumb. “You can say that.”

You smiled at him as he wrote something down. It’s nice, having these genuine calls with him—it feels almost more normal that you haven’t seen him in a few months’ time. You proceeded with your makeup and pack on the shade he told you to. Something moved in the corner of your eye and when you look back to your phone, you notice that he’s holding his up to the screen, blocking his face.

“Are you taking pictures?!” you accused, quickly hiding your face behind the palette.

“You’re too pretty not to. Put it down, [Name]!”

“Stop,” you whined. “I can’t focus if you’re recording me!”

“So? I want a new lock screen. You never send me selfies anymore.”

“Because you keep doing shit like this.”

“Okay, fine. I’ll stop recording if you send me a selfie before going out. Okay?”

You peeked over your palette and saw that he’d put the phone down, both large hands up in surrender. He smiled wryly at you.

“Fine, Mr. Needy.”

“Of course I’m needy,” he complained, leaning forwards. He put his head into both hands, which squished his face. “I miss you.”

“Yeah… I miss you too.”

You finished your eyeliner and mascara and pop on a casual lip tint. You and Tooru don’t really have much of anything else to say, sharing each other’s company quietly instead. 

“How do I look?” you asked when you’ve finished setting your face with a spray. He looked up, and you can practically see his face melt. His lopsided grin makes your stomach do gymnastics in your gut. Even now, you can’t get over him.

“Gorgeous, as usual.”

“All right. I’m gonna get dressed and head out.”

“Have fun. Text me when you’re home. And don’t forget to send me pictures!”

“Okay, _dad_ ,” you teased. You picked up your phone and gave him one last smile. “I can’t wait to see you whenever I see you.”

He touched his hand to his laptop screen. For a second you can actually feel it cupping your cheek. 

“Yeah. Me too.”


	5. — LET ME TAKE YOUR HAND AND LET ME FEEL YOU —

It’s not like he was proud of being a stalker, but he missed her, okay?

Whenever he ended up on Instagram he always went straight to his page to look back at pictures of him with his friends, family, and girlfriend. It was admittedly a little sad, looking at your own page to stare at your own posts, but they were the only ones he was interested in seeing. His sister would post pictures of Takeru and he’d like them despite being on a shared cloud for Takeru’s pictures anyways. A couple funny memes, cool volleyball clips, space updates, fashion videos… His friends from Japan weren’t tech savvy, so Iwaizumi didn’t even _have_ an Instagram. And [Name] wasn’t the type to post very often, but these days, she was getting tagged _in_ a lot of posts.

A lot of them were her with clubs or volunteering, smiling cheerily in a crowd wearing a different organization’s t-shirt each time. He’d have to squint a little to see her, sometimes. Some were with the high school friends he was familiar with and followed. Some were with new people, and some of these new people were boys.

It was a spiral of him frantically tapping on people’s names and resisting the urge to make a burner account to follow these random dudes just to see what was up. He resorted to zooming in and trying his hardest to see their faces in the icon if they had a private account. If it was public, he’d be scrolling back to six years ago, being painfully careful not to accidentally like something from 2010. He’d also judge their bios. What an ugly use of emojis—this loser must be some sort of mindless jock. She was friends with business majors too, apparently. _Business_? Come on, [Name]. You can do better than that.

In any case, he kept these antics to himself. It’d only upset her if he admitted how nosy he got, and the only reason he was being nosy in the first place was because he couldn’t be there in person to meet her friends himself. 

“Hey,” he brought up all of the sudden for their ritualistic Saturday night/Sunday morning call. She raised her head groggily.

“What?”

“Would you like if I sent you one of my sweaters? Since you can’t steal them anymore.”

“I’d love that!” she gushed, sitting up straight and beaming. “I still wear your Seijoh jacket.”

“You do?” he asked, already feeling the corners of his lips lifting. Her smiles always seemed so contagious. She nodded, getting out of her chair and blurrily disappearing out of frame to open her closet. When she came back, she held up the jacket he’d given her in their final year of high school. The white and cyan looked painfully bright through the screen.

“It doesn’t smell like you anymore, and it’s huge, but of course I still wear it. It reminds me of you, dummy.”

“Then you’ll have to mail me something back too that I can show off.”

“Um… what do you want?” she asked skeptically. “It’s not like you can fit _my_ clothes.”

“Anything, really. Surprise me. And who knows? Maybe I could rock a skirt.”

“Pfft. No you couldn’t.”

He paid for express shipping—well, of course he did. The sooner she got his package of Club Atlético San Juan endorsed sweaters with OIKAWA right there on the sleeve, the sooner people would figure out she was off limits. And, she kept her word, keeping her gift to him a surprise secret until the day he picked up a box from the post office. He couldn’t help but shake it around in the taxi, feeling giddy like a kid on Christmas Eve waiting for the clock to tick down to Christmas morning.

He opened the box by practically tearing it open with bare hands. Then, with utmost care, he picked out the handwritten card [Name] had laid on top. Her handwriting hadn’t changed at all from what he remembered in second year chemistry on their lab reports. The message was short, but sweet, and he resisted the urge to stand there and hold the card to his chest like a fool. Onto the good stuff, he looked down and pulled out a scarf, a scrunchie, and a box with a ring on a chain. He smelt it before realizing and his brain surged with a rush of dopamine before he could even figure out why… he could already imagine her standing next to him, resting her head onto his shoulder. Her perfume? She’d sprayed everything with perfume so that it’d smell like her even through transit.

“I love you [Name],” he breathed to himself, knowing she couldn’t hear, but hoping she would know anyways.

“ _Tou! What’s that? Why you’re playing volleyball with the bracelet thing_?”

Tooru looked down at the felt scrunchie stretched across his left wrist and grinned, thrilled to have an excuse to show it off. Carlos tilted his head as he jogged up to him, hands on his hips.

“It’s from my girlfriend,” Tooru replied proudly. “Back home in Japan.”

“Eh!?” he exclaimed, recoiling with the shock. “ _You_ have girlfriend?”

“Hah. Of course. Want to see a picture?” 

While pulling his phone out, he felt the buzz; **@[username] has tagged you in a post.** He swiped on the notification and waited for it load. It was a picture of her standing in the mirror with his sweater hanging off her frame, three times too large for her. She hid her face with her phone, but he read the kanji of her caption quickly: _missing stinky._ She’d tagged him on the sleeve where OIKAWA was stitched.

“Show your girl’s face!” Carlos complained, frustrated as he peeked over Tooru’s shoulder. 

“Fine, just wait!” 

But he was already smiling, the smell of her perfume always at the back of his mind like the gentle reminder of what love means. It stays with you day in, day out—love between lovers is timeless, but most importantly of all, _distanceless_.


	6. [ you turned my heart to fire from broken stone ]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ybBZYdWxwxQ

“You know, I really am sorry.”

“What are you sorry for?”

Tooru shifted his head on his knees uncomfortably. Even though you were trying to put on a neutral face, and even though you were just looking into a black dot of a camera, you could almost see his eyes burn right through you.

“For not being home for the holidays.”

Tooru, Tooru, Tooru.

You had only been able to hold out this long because the Christmas and New Year’s winter break extended to two weeks for most University students. It was a time of festivity, love, family, and fun. It’s the most wonderful time of year, and it was when Tooru was supposed to come back home. But apparently, his league had scheduled mandatory practices through the break, and he had decided only recently to let you know that you would be spending the holidays all by your lonesome.

“It’s not like it can be helped,” you replied coolly.

But it could be helped, couldn’t it? What if Tooru decided not to go to these practices? What if he decided to just come home? Not going to practice meant possibly losing a place on the team—so _what_? It wasn’t like you were _definitely_ cut from the team. It’s not like you lost your legs and could never play again. 

Apparently, a sport’s more important than seeing the people you love. 

You tried to justify it in your head so it’s not all about you. What about his own family and his own friends? What kind of selfish life does he lead that he won’t come home to meet his new niece? 

Well, it’s no use rationalizing—you’re already a rational person. You already know that you’re the selfish one here, moping about, taking skype calls just to sit there in fuming silence so that he feels bad about how upset you are. 

“If you were really sorry, you’d be home by now.”

It’s already out of your mouth before you can stop yourself. The words burn a hole through you all the way down to your feet. You shouldn’t have said it, but the fact that you even had the thought to say it—well. Maybe that’s the rational part of you speaking out after all.

“I don’t know if you can forgive me, but tomorrow. Give me an hour with you. I want to do something special for you.”

You almost scoffed in his face but settled for rolling your eyes, as if that might stop the stinging in your jaw. ‘Do something special’—as if you can do anything fucking special for your girlfriend from across the goddamn planet.

“Please,” he urged. Begged.

“Fine,” you muttered, lowering your gaze and picking angrily at your nails. It’d make you feel worse to ignore him completely, so you might as well entertain him. That’s what this relationship’s all about to him—you entertain him, and he throws you around the bends.

“[Name], I’m sorry.”

You sucked in a breath. You already said what you wanted to say about him actually being apologetic.

“All I wanted was to hold you,” you said, as calmly as you possibly could. He winced, and you saw him recoil. Good. _Feel the pain I’m feeling._

It was evil of you to think that, you already _know_. But you’re hurting so damn bad and it’s all because you’re a little more in love with him than he seems to be with you. It’s all your fault. You know this, you know—but that doesn’t stop it from crushing you any less agonizingly.

“That’s what I want, too. Believe me, darling.”

‘Darling’? How dare you.

You blinked back your tears.

“I want to make it up to you, so all you need to give me is one hour on Christmas. That’s it.”

“It’ll be Christmas eve for you,” you reminded him blankly. He nodded remorsefully.

“I know.”

“Okay. I’ll see you then.”

“[Name], I lo—”

You hung up on him before he could finish, neatly tucked yourself up into a ball, and wept.

\---

Christmas morning rolled in. You pretended not to have spent the entire eve crying over your stupid boyfriend and packed on all the brightening make-up and false platitudes you could. You were home with your family, which was simultaneously nice and dreadful. You ate an unholy amount of food that left you paralyzed on the couch. You opened the presents everybody had gotten you, and for a while it all seemed okay. You were happy for a while.

Then ten o’clock struck, and you opened your laptop, apprehension a sinking lead ball in your stomach.

“Merry Christmas [Name]!” he greeted, the minute you picked up. He had apparently decided that forgetting what happened yesterday was the best course of action and was as chipper as ever. He wore an ugly Christmas sweater, showing off a pattern of a derpy reindeer outlined by snowflakes. For a moment, you wondered if you should continue on being resentful… but nothing good comes out of that. Letting it go, you sighed and smiled back wearily.

“Merry Christmas, Tooru.”

“Click on the link I sent.”

You opened the chat and went ahead, following the blue hyperlink. It opened to screen sharing. Tooru wiggled his mouse, and you watched the cursor jiggle on your screen. He had Chrome open, blocking his wallpaper, but you saw the top of yours and his head behind the window.

“What’s this supposed to be?” you asked, curiosity getting the better of you.

“Hold on a second, would you? Cover your eyes.”

Of course, he’s always one for dramatics. But you obliged, making a show of covering your eyes with your hands and squeezing them shut. You heard his keyboard clacking. You couldn’t deny that you were starting to get excited in anticipation.

“Ah… okay, you can open them.”

You did. You had no idea what you were expecting to look at, but it wasn’t this. You saw that he’d opened up Google Maps of all things. He’d loaded street view and you noticed the pin dropped at EZE: Ministro Pistarini International Airport. Blurred out people in freeze frame were all over your screen, making you feel like you were standing around in your own tacky tourist shorts.

“You’re at the Buenos Aires airport. I’ve come in from San Juan to pick you up—because I’m a fantastic boyfriend.” Movement made your eyes twitch back to the little window with him in it, and you saw he was already holding up a sign that said **♡ [SURNAME] [NAME] ♡** in his scratchy hand writing. He smiled gently.

“Tooru?” you asked, bewildered by the sudden role-play narrative. 

“It’s a Google Maps holiday,” he explained, peeking over his sign. “Play along, please?”

Your heart. It _burst_. Maybe if you were a little more wine-drunk, you’d be crying. But you held it together, holding back your overload of affection, and nodded.

“Okay. I’m at the airport. I kick you.”

“Why’d you kick me?!”

“Because you’re annoying. But then… I’d kiss you.”

He laughed softly. “Fair enough. Well, we get into a taxi, and go on to… the museum.”

You watched the screen shift, warping along. In the museum, the pictures are low quality, but he dragged his mouse around to give you both a panoramic view.

“I like that painting,” you chimed in. 

“We could take a picture here together.”

“No, the lighting would wash me out. We’ll take pictures back out front by that statue you passed.”

“Good idea. 

After that, we walk outside and go to the beach.”

Again, a speedy transition. Turquoise water met turquoise skies, endless and forever. Big slate grey rocks piled on top of warm looking sand. You realized Tooru had queued a sound effect loop of the beach, complete with crashing waves and squawking sea gulls. It was tinny through the speakers, but you could almost taste the salt on your lips.

“We hold hands, apply sunscreen on each other, get a little handsy…”

“Let’s keep it safe for work, Tooru.”

“Fine. Then we’d go and build sand castles. I wanted us to work on one together, but you wanted to compete. Mine’s better than yours because I’m awesome and you suck.”

“I step on your sand castle.”

“[Name]!”

You laughed. It’s a good laugh; a real one. It’s been a while since you’ve been able to laugh like that. The last time was probably right before he’d told you that he wasn’t coming home.

He smiled and continued.

“And we go to the water, swim around a bit. You’d probably splash me in the face and laugh at my hair.”

“You stole my line!”

“Uh huh. But I’d grab you and hug you and we’d just stand there and float around for a bit. Close to each other.”

You closed your eyes, listening intently.

“And then I’d kiss you. Even though it’s not a white Christmas, it’s our Christmas.”

You opened your eyes and saw him staring at you.

“I miss you, Tooru,” you whispered brokenly. Your emotions crashed and suddenly you were clapping a hand over your mouth, trying to quiet down your sobs. The dark fog returned overhead, and your heart was wrenched by grief. It was so unfair… God, it was so unfair that the only thing between you was distance.

“I know. And I miss you too. I’m so, _so_ sorry I’m not there. But this means… _so_ much to me. I can’t ask you to forgive me, but I swear I’ll make it up to you.”

He can’t swipe your tears away when you cry. He can only speak to you, the words crackly over a mechanical speaker. The one thing he can do for you is give you promises that you’re not sure will ever be met.

“I love you. I want to spend my entire life with you. I hate it when you’re sad. It kills me, you know? And this time, I know it’s my fault. But if you give me a lifetime, I’ll spend it making you happy. So please forgive me for this.”

You nodded, hiccupping back your tears. It’s embarrassing of you to cry so much over a boy, but this boy throws you around the bends, and you’re the damn fool who lets him. You wiped your own tears away by yourself, soaking them up in the sleeves of your sweater. Focusing on your breaths, you tried to stop. He waited for you to calm down patiently, knowing it was now up to you, and he had done all he could.

“Okay,” you whispered. “Okay.”

“Okay.”

“Can we… go to a restaurant? I want to eat.”

He blinked, and then nodded, smiling wryly at you. “Yeah. This one place has the _best_ empanadas. I’ll take you.”

You drew your knees up to your chest and rested your head on them, watching him type in an address. You went to lots of places together, him describing the texture and flavours of foods to you as well as the searing heat of the weather—you and him also visited stores he’d never even seen before. Clicking and dragging. If you thought hard enough, you could almost feel his rough fingers laced around yours as he hauled you through bustling South American streets.

“I love you.”

You didn’t know why you said it now, all of the sudden. He looked up at you, the two of you staring at each other silently through screens. There was a lot of meaning behind those three worn words; some of which you didn’t even understand for yourself. But what’s said is said.

“In the New Year… I promise that I’ll never make you cry like this again.”

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep.”

“I’ll try pretty damn hard for this one.”

Idiot. He was already breaking his promise before it even begun as the tears hotly beaded on your lower lash line. Idiot, stupid, moron—well, aren’t you’re the dumb one for falling so madly in love with him?

Looks like the two of you have got more things in common than you knew.


	7. — I'VE WAITED ALL THIS TIME JUST TO GET TO HOLD YOU —

“[Name],” he whined, “it’s cold.”

“Okay, you big baby. You should’ve worn a jacket, then.”

“This is the part where you get all cute and offer me your jacket,” he huffed. She turned to him, stopping in the sidewalk.

“You’re the guy, aren’t you?”

“What happened to equality?!”

She crossed her arms but had a wry smile that turned her lips upwards in a way that made his heart swell to twice its size. She wore the Seijoh girls’ uniform, its skirt fluttering in the wind. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen her hair this short. 

“All you do is complain. Can’t we just spend some time together properly?”

He sighed through his nose and reached for her hand. She grabbed it and grinned. It was small and soothingly warm, softer than he could ever imagine. Wrapped around his, he felt his entire body relax. 

He was home.

“ _¿Quieres salir conmigo?_ ”

“What?” [Name] replied, raising her eyebrow. Alvaro leant in, his irritatingly symmetrical smile blindingly white. His shiny black hair looked particularly groomed, though when was it not? 

“ _Dale!_ ” he urged, his tone dropping flirtatiously. “ _Tomemos una copa._ ”

Tooru watched her tuck her fingers into her jeans’ belt loops, something she did whenever she was nervous or fidgety. He couldn’t move, glued to his spot. But it didn’t matter, because [Name] was his, and she would never do anything to betr—

“‘Kay.”

They walked away from him, her hands tucked around his tanned arms. She was laughing, squeezing his biceps. The rage seeped through him, wet and hot. He tried to yell but he didn’t have a goddamn voice. He just had to keep watching, keep _looking_ at her wrapped around his roommate’s little finger. Why? It was like his vision had gotten distorted, the way paint gets muddled when you dunk a brush in clear water. His entire body was shaking. There was no way. The hot breeze tousled his hair; seagulls squawked as if to mock him in laughter. This wasn’t real, this just wasn’t—

“Dude, shut your alarm the fucking hell up!”

A pillow hit him unceremoniously, quite literally whacking him into reality. He sat up so quickly he almost nailed his head onto the bunk above him. Dream. Realizing it was in fact his stupid alarm beeping cheerily and vibrating beneath his head, he dug under his own pillow and clicked the power button of his phone, snoozing it. His heart was still racing in his chest as he gasped for breath.

It’d just been a fucking dream.

It was 7 (ish), meaning it was time for him to get ready for his 8AM. That meant it was only early evening in Japan. He hurriedly unlocked his phone and dove right into [Name]’s contact, seeing she was last active only an hour ago.

 **You:** I miss you.

He lay back down and waited, completely paralyzed. Glancing over across the room, he saw Alvaro’s back, his impossibly carved muscles outlined in naked detail as the asshole didn’t bother wearing a shirt to sleep despite sharing a 4-person dorm. Why was he dreaming about other guys picking up his Japanese girlfriend? That didn’t make any sense. Now that he was thinking about it, [Name] didn’t speak Spanish, though she’d somehow managed to understand Alvaro anyways. When had the dream shifted, anyways? He didn’t even notice that he’d been having two dreams until he woke up. Her outfit and hair had changed entirely, though he wasn’t the type to lucid dream easily, and had just accepted that as normal. Why hadn’t he been able to stop it? Wait— _hey_ , why had dream [Name] went along with it so easily?!

The anger bubbled resentfully, but it wasn’t like he could blame her. It’d be psychotic and completely unfair of him to accuse a person for crimes a dream version that he himself thought up had committed. But still, his heart ached deeply in his chest. Was she really leaving him behind after all? What if it was a clairvoyant type of dream, the kind people talk about when they’re really close to their soulmates? _I just knew something was going to go wrong. I felt it._

He’d never felt more powerless before in his life. He’d never missed her touch more now that he’d felt it again, even if it was just a figment of his own neurotic spasms. It was like giving a starving animal a taste of a treat it’d forgotten. The hunger burnt stronger. 

Tooru checked his screen again. She hadn’t read it, though it had delivered. Maybe she was at dinner. He bit his tongue sharply when the thought emerged like a poisonous cloud at the very back of his mind; _what if she’s at dinner with another man and isn’t replying because she’s guilty_ —

Long distance is built on trust, and longing. It’s not a solution to anything; it’s always a problem. _The_ problem. And he felt like this one was just getting worse and worse.


	8. [ i've wanted you so long]

You didn’t expect to get a call from him, much less a drunk call, but here you are.

“I _miss_ you,” he whined, and you sighed. It’s been like this for fifteen minutes.

“I know, beloved. I miss you too.” And you do, you really do, but hearing it for the millionth time is starting to make it lose its gravitas. 

The drinking age there is lower than it is here, so it’s not like he’s in the wrong for getting wasted, but you kind of wish he hadn’t called at all. Now you _know_ he’s out there, flushed in the face and teary eyed and begging for _you_ , and you can’t even be there to hold him. You’ve never gotten to see him drunk before. You’re just listening to him ramble, and it’s no replacement.

“Tooru; you _are_ home, right?” Thinking about how you’re powerless to do anything but talk to him gets the better of your paranoia. You imagine him on a hot boardwalk, passed out in the sand or something. You’d hate that. You also hate imagining him at a bar, busty Argentinian women surrounding him as he grins that secretive smile that he only smiles for you. Your breath feels like poison in your lungs.

“I’m at a priend’s flace.” 

Relief washes over you. It’s not a good look to be jealous, you know, but you can’t help it when you haven’t seen your boyfriend in months. Speaking of time… you steal a look to the clock.

“Then you should go to bed.” It’s early morning for you and late night for him. You’ve got school to get to, but with him weeping on the line like this, you know you’re going to be late regardless. “Drink some water so your hangover isn’t so bad.”

“You’re not with me in the bed. I don’t wanna. I wanna touch you. And kiss you.”

You juggle getting ready with the phone, not wanting to put it on speaker since your parents are probably up. For once you’re actually glad that he can’t see your face, because his words are making you blush. “I know, but you need to get your beauty sleep. Otherwise you’ll get all ugly.”

“So mean…”

Your lips quirked into a smile. “Yours truly.”

“Can you wait ‘till I fall asleep then?”

“Tooru,” you chide half-heartedly, “you’re going to sink a hole in my bank with the international fees.”

“Then sing me to sleep so I pass out sooner.”

You paused, one sock on, the other balled up in your hand. “You want me to sing to you?”

“Yeah,” he mumbled, and there’s static as he rolls over or something. “Whenever you sing in the shower or something… I don’t want to share your voice anymore. I miss it. Sing to me.”

“I’m not going to sing to you!” you protested, embarrassed at the thought of serenading your grown boyfriend halfway across the world through a crappy phone call. “Just go to bed!”

“You’re so mean… why not…?”

“Because it’s embarrassing,” you retorted.

“So?”

“So… uh…” You’re floundering. You don’t want to do it, necessarily, but you can already envision his pout. He’s quiet and for a second you wondered if he accidentally fell asleep, freeing you from the dilemma, but:

“I miss you so much my heart hurts. My head aches and all I can think about is putting my head in your lap.”

He’s suddenly so fluent that it’s like he was just faking all the drunk gibberish. Your palm is clammy as it clings onto your phone. You’re about to say something when he whispers,

“I dunno if this is gonna’ work anymore, [Name].”

Your heart stopped in your chest mid-beat.

“What?”

The line clicked suddenly, and you look down at your phone in horror. He’s ended the call. No, no—how dare you? How fucking _dare_ you?! You call him back, furiously, but he doesn’t pick up. He doesn’t look at your texts, and you can see that this motherfucker is active and your messages have delivered, but he doesn’t open them. He’s just gone.

The tears dribble from your eyes. _No_.


	9. — YOU CANNOT UNDERSTAND THE WAY THAT I LOVE YOU BABY —

With every notification from her he swiped away, another nail stabbed him through the heart.

It’d been a couple of days of his radio silence. He _knew_ it was wrong of him. He knew full well that he was hurting her. He was being childish, even cruel, but the torment of just the _thought_ of facing her after what he said was harder to bear than continuing this pathetic display of cowardice.

With an athlete’s metabolism you don’t really get hungover, but God, did he wish for it after waking up. He didn’t deserve anything but the worst fuck-up for blurting that shit out. He’d never had such a strong urge to turn back the clock. How could he just say that to her?

_“I don’t know if this is going to work anymore, [Name].”_

The kicker is: he meant it.

It destroys his world when he admits it to himself, but you can’t go back once you’ve burnt your bridges. She was, at one point—even now—the love of his life. He’d loved his exes too, but never so fully as he did [Name]. She wasn’t just different, or special, or anything like that; she was his. It was never meant to be like this. In high school it was just casual attraction, and he knew she knew he knew there was an unwritten expiry date. It didn’t have to end badly or anything, but who keeps a high school relationship going after graduation? Still, the day just… never seemed to come. It kept being put off. 

For how much longer? Just how much longer could she stand him?

This wasn’t just a short-time delay, and it never had been. It wasn’t like he’d be done any time soon and truck on back home. This was _life_ for him now. Home, and all the things it held, were behind him, and he was standing on his own.

It wasn’t fair of him to subject her to this anymore. He didn’t even know what he’d been thinking. To her, he must seem like some kind of selfish runaway, and in essence that was all he knew to do. It had been a very long time since he’d been unable to see a future. Ambition driven, he had never faltered before. When he pictured her, he saw her smile with ease, the one that glows in the dark and makes him flutter and fly. But he didn’t see himself by her side. He couldn’t, anymore.

The realism is crushing, but what did he hope was going to happen? That she’d be okay with him living his life abroad for _at least_ the next few years to come? How do you nurture a relationship on New Years visits alone? There’d always been this sort of unspoken understanding that they’d be together again soon enough, like this was just a temporary bump in the road.

The Andes are mountains. 

But it can’t go on like this forever. The longer he puts it off, the more he’ll hate himself. If he’s going to end it, he has to do it seriously. For her sake, not his. It’s just that (and he knows this)—he’s a selfish bastard, and he doesn’t want to let it go.

All good things come to an end, right?

He kind of wants to get drunk again to make it easier, but that’s not fair. He got himself into this mess in the first place because of sweet dear tequila, but also, she deserves more than whatever half-baked bullshit he’s got for her. His roommates had all gone out clubbing, leaving him to himself. After pacing in a cold sweat, he finally bit the bullet and dialled her. He didn’t have the stomach to search for her contact and he knew each number by heart.

“Hello?” she answered coldly, right as he’d given up. Her tone made him flinch, but he’d promised himself to see this through.

“Hey.”

“Some fucking nerve you got.” She was so, _so_ mad. He swallowed thickly, staring forwards like she might be able to see the anguish written across his face.

“I know. I’m sorry. I was just thinking, and… we need to talk.”

“Yeah. We do.” There was some aggravated clattering and banging on her end as she seemed to settle into a seat. His stomach was tying itself into knots. He hated this so much. This was worse than having a serve at match point. This was worse than eating bad ceviche. Damn, this was the worst he’d ever felt in his entire life. How can one girl have so much control over your life?

“Look…” He took a deep breath in the silence, knowing she was listening. “It’s not that I don’t love you. Don’t get me wrong. But I just don’t think that I’m good enough.”

He said it. It hurt, deeply, irreparably, but he finally said it. The truth. She was so quiet for over a minute that he nervously glanced at his phone screen to see if she’d just hung up on him.

“You don’t get to fucking decide shit for me.”

“I. Uh. What?” The profanity was throwing him off his balance. He could practically see her scowling at him, hands on her hips. 

“What makes you think _you_ get to decide if you’re good enough for me? That’s _my_ choice, isn’t it?”

“You’re not hearing me,” he argued, frowning. He didn’t have the audacity to think this’d be easy, but he hoped that she’d at least make it less painful than it already was. “I just don’t think we can make this work.”

“So what, you’re giving up? Like some kind of pussy?”

Had some sort of ultra-aggressive goddess of war possessed her? Where had the sweet girl he knew gone?! He was so stunned he didn’t even have a reply, the rehearsed choruses in his head spinning around a drain in his head. 

“I’m stronger than you think, Tooru,” she continued, her voice suddenly softening. It sounded vulnerable, like she was near tears, and the strain broke his heart.

“I know you are. But this is for your sake. Don’t you get that? You’re only going to hurt yourself if you don’t…” He inhaled shakily, his jaw stinging. “Don’t end things with me. We can still be friends. I can’t keep leading you on or getting your hopes up for no reason.”

“Is that what you think?”

He didn’t know what to say. There was more tense silence that seemed to be full of heavy, unspoken words. He heard her sigh.

“I don’t want to give up, Tou.”

He closed his eyes. Behind his eyelids, he saw her, laughing, reaching out to him—his eyes shot open again and he gripped onto the pole of his bed so hard the tendons in his hands jumped.

“I know. I don’t want to, either, but let’s think about what’s best for us.” _Please. I won’t have the strength if you keep doing this._

“What’s best for me is having you in my life. Not as a friend, but my _boyfriend_. I don’t care that we’re long distance. Okay? I want to go out with you again. I want to kiss you, and show you off to my friends, and hug you—okay? I want to do all those things so bad it kills me. So what makes you think it’s _best_ to just let all that go to waste?”

His heart pounded in his ears the more she spoke. _Me, too. I want all those things too._ She was so hopeful, so strong—but how could he cave? Wasn’t it better to break her heart now and give her time to heal than to do it too late?

But he couldn’t speak. He wanted her too badly.

“Are you sure?” he breathed shakily, the tears rolling down his face. He didn’t bother brushing them away, bearing his shame. He stared at the wall instead, determinedly, as if not blinking would suddenly make her appear before him. “I’m not going to let you back out if you change your mind.”

“I’m not going to change my mind. You’re a dumbass, and I’m in love with you regardless. Haven’t I made myself clear?”

He didn’t know how she could have the strength to joke around with him, but he laughed anyways, the sound impossibly ugly when combined with his crying. Finally, he swiped the snot from his nose, reaching for a tissue. She was sniffling quietly herself. She and him sat on the line and cried for a while as he tried to recollect himself. What was he even feeling right now? Guilt that he couldn’t follow through? Or was it relief? It didn’t even matter what it was, because it felt so _good_. 

“I don’t care if you find somebody new. You’re not allowed.”

“Don’t have such a low opinion of me,” she retorted. “I’ve already got a looker of a man. He’s perfect.”

“Who is it?!” he gasped exaggeratedly, thankful to be able to just talk with her normally again. “I’m gonna beat him up!” 

She laughed, and the sound seemed to settle his soul. “It’s you. It’s always going to be you.” She inhaled deeply, and in a whisper: “Hey. I love you.”

The words seared through him. He pressed his forehead to the bar, feeling the cold metal on his clammy skin. It didn’t matter how hard he tried to ground himself. He was floating back to her. He could be on the other end of Earth or in an entirely different universe, but his heart just kept coming back to her. 

“I love you so much. I’m really sorry it took me this long.”

“Yeah, dick move. But… I get it. It’s not easy.” She sighed heavily. “I miss you a lot. It’s hard.”

“I miss you too.”

“Don’t be cheesy. Think of something original for once, yeah?”

His lips quirked up into a smile. “All right, light of my life.”

“Oh yeah? Keep ‘em coming.”

“Darling.”

“Mm… three out of five.”

“Honeybee.”

“Four.”

“Babygirl.”

“Eh… two.”

“I’m getting worse?!”

The two of them seemed to break out into laughter at the same time. The sun was down for him, creeping up for her, as if carrying everything he wanted to give her with its messenger light.

He didn’t understand. How did he end up with somebody like her? How could he deserve her—somebody who made him so happy, who he loved so much it physically hurt him? He didn’t know. And, actually, he decided he’d stop caring. 

She was his. She would be for as long as she would let him. That much was enough.


	10. [ my heart is slowly wilting as i'm sitting here alone ]

You always think you’re so grown up until you realize that you aren’t.

Tooru comes to mind at the most unexpected moments. The two of you are busy people. It can’t be helped. There’re hefty prices to pay as an adult and compromises you can no longer avoid. Promises that you’ll talk for hours every day fade away because it’s just not possible to juggle three thousand and one things any more. You might spend days without even being able to text each other. Post-secondary exams and high-stake matches and even the basics like self-care vie for attention. Despite your hectic touch-and-go lifestyle, you’d walk past a café and see minimalist milk bread in the window. High school students would sprint past you to catch the train, their uniforms fluttering in the wind. People shyly holding hands, keeping each other warm. He was there in everything. In a way, it made you sad to miss him constantly; in another, it made you happy that he was always with you. Love has a funny way of doing that: it cuts you more deeply than anything else and also heals you more fully than anything else. 

Things did sometimes get awkward when you kept having to explain yourself. People kept inviting you to mixers and then accused you of being a hermit for always declining when you looked perfectly single. The story of “my boyfriend is actually a pro-league athlete that was famous in high school and lives on the other side of the globe but we’re continuing our relationship long-distance and I’m still madly in love with him despite not seeing him for like years yes I know this sounds fake but trust me” got long-winded after a while. Your parents also didn’t approve of you holding onto something so intangible, and you couldn’t blame them for worrying. Tooru’s solution for this was shipping you a package under express postage, and you hadn’t taken it off ever since. For a guy whose head is only full of fluff and volleyballs, he can come up with some pretty good ideas. 

An alarm jolts you out of your post-lecture exhaustion nap. You opened your eyes blearily, realizing that you haven’t even changed out of your jeans. It’s a new kind of tired to be passing out in denim, but cram season is right around the corner. At least you made it to bed. You fished your phone out from under your pillows, squinting at the screen to try and remember why you’d set it in the first place. 

“Oh fuck,” you cursed, scrambling out of bed to retrieve your laptop from your bag. It was time for Tooru’s big game. You hadn’t told him that you’d be tuning in, and there were a couple you’d neglected because you were preoccupied with work or studying. But he’d said this one was important, and you wouldn’t miss it for the world.

You didn’t exactly get the sports world despite being dragged into it for so long. But if Japanese media was covering a foreign game, it had to be pretty special. You managed to plug everything in and log on just as an advertisement was ending. If you had a 50 yen coin for every pixel on this live stream, you’d have 50 yen. The quality was dirt poor, but you could still make things out, and that was the best you were going to get. The lag probably meant that _that_ many people were watching. 

**“Oikawa Tooru-san was a memorable player all throughout his high school career. Leading Aoba Johsai High School as captain in 2012, he was a favourite to represent Miyagi for the All-Japan National Tournament. He never made it to the tournament, but his exceptional playing ability had him scouted for the Argentinian team ‘Club Athletico San Juan’…”**

It was relaxing to hear the game covered in your native language for once. You settled back with your headphones, smiling as people praised your lover. It kind of made you smug, even though you knew you shouldn’t be—still, you couldn’t help but be proud. The ‘poor guy’ who’d never played at Japanese Nationals was on national TV now, staking his claim in an entirely different continent. He had made it big and he wasn’t even close to finished. _And_ he was your boyfriend. Hah!

**“We caught a short interview with Oikawa-san before warm ups. Here’s what he had to say.”**

That bastard never mentioned that he’d done an interview. Shit. If you didn’t gear up, he was going to leave you in the dust with all these impressive achievements. It wasn’t like _you_ were going to be globe-trotting to represent an esteemed sports team yourself, but you couldn’t let him out-do you nonetheless. 

He’d been interviewed plenty of times before for high school sports magazines. You’d gotten pretty used to it; on those days, he’d always get a bigger-than-usual ego. But now he was going to be heard by the entirety of Japan—no, the _world_. Oh, you hoped he didn’t say anything stupid.

He was dressed in his jersey, and the height difference between him and the poor reporter as they stood in a hallway together looked ridiculous. They talked about sport-y things you didn’t really care for all too much. Player stats, past games, strategy, ‘hopes for the future’—it was all yada-yada stuff, but you were so in love with him that you could listen to him talk about nothing all day. If you closed your eyes, it kind of felt like he was right beside you, gushing about sports as you tuned out. He always got this glow when he was excited about something. A comfortable smile was on your face without you even knowing. 

**“What’s your prediction for today’s game?”**

**“We’ll win, of course. I’ve got to. I made a promise, after all.”**

**“Aha ha. To a special somebody, Oikawa-kun?”**

**“You can say something like that.”**

Your eyes snapped open. Had he actually said something like that to you? Your text logs had been bare bones leading up to this match, and you only remembered him talking about how huge the game was going to be the last time you called. You racked your brains, but they were still talking.

**“The ladies are dying to know! They’ve flooded my inbox with questions. Help me out, please! Has somebody captured your attention?”**

**“Ah, she’s had it for a long time. I’m held captive by her, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.”**

**“There you have it. That’s all from star player Oikawa-san. Now, today’s match also involves Japanese born player—”**

You were too unfocused to pay attention to the rest of the broadcaster’s dialogue, wishing you were recording the un-rewindable livestream instead. That soft, cheesy smile he’d flashed to the camera—to _you_ —was burnt into your memory. You wished you could’ve saved it for a stupid lock screen or something. Well; plenty of chances to take screenshots later. You twisted the delicate ring on your left hand as you curled up, ready to cheer him on. 

You had a lifetime with him ahead of you, after all.


	11. Chapter 11

**i wished upon a star…**

Airports are gateways into other dimensions where time is fluid, and everything is off kilter. Nothing feels quite real. You pace on the spot, chewing your nails off.

His layover had been delayed. Something about a storm in the tropics. Now you can’t stop thinking about the worst-case scenario, like getting an intercom message solemnly informing people that flight B136 is sinking to the bottom of the ocean. It’s been _so long_ since you’ve seen him—well, touched him—and it kind of feels like Tooru isn’t real anymore. You’ve forgotten how his hands feel against yours. What does he smell like? You need to hold him again. Up until now, you had been okay, carrying on by promises and faith. But you’re _not_ okay anymore. You’ve never needed anybody like you needed him, and you just can’t go on without him anymore. You know it’s cheesy, childish, pathetic, whatever—you miss your boyfriend so much that you don’t care anymore.

It seems almost unfair that it’s 2:57 PM on a Tuesday. It’s such a normal, boring time that it doesn’t do this moment justice. You expected more _drama_ for your reunion, more pathetic fallacy. Where’s the heartfelt ballad that plays in all those K-dramas as they run towards each other in slow-mo?

He was supposed to land at 2 local time, and his last text was around 12. You don’t know what’s happening, and the people around you seem to share the same anxiety. Your stomach sinks with every passing second until it’s like you’ve drowned. You start to pray.

Then a person walks out the gate.

The man smiles as he hugs a woman, lugging baggage behind him. A small group of people crowd around him excitedly, asking him about his trip. It must be his family. You force yourself not to eavesdrop, knowing that you won’t get any closer to Tooru by spying on others. The others waiting with you perk up simultaneously, collective relief washing over people’s faces. Some get to their feet, preparing. A lot of people are in pairs or groups. You stand by your lonesome. Tooru’s family isn’t here, having gotten caught up with personal affairs at home. You thought that he might try the cruel surprise of randomly showing up at your door without telling you that he was coming home, but since you’re his ride, you’re the one who has to wait for him. Alone.

You’ve never felt _more_ alone than in this huge crowd of people.

More and more people trickle through the gate, looking tired, but brightening when the people waiting for them come forwards. It’s a long walkway before they clear to the waiting area, and it’s almost like they’re models strutting down a runway to be ogled. Not him. Not him. Not him. Your anxiety spikes again. Did he get on the wrong flight or something? Did you get the gate wrong? What if he’s gotten detained by security for some reason? What if—

When he walks through the doors, you barely even notice. But your eyes lock with his, and it’s like your heart stops in your chest. It’s him.

You somehow manage to urge your feet to move. They feel like they’ve fallen asleep, all pins and needles. You stagger through the crowd, dragging yourself along. He doesn’t break eye contact with you as he starts to run towards you. Neither of you have said anything yet, but your ears feel blown out, deafened. You’re so sluggish it feels like you’re moving through the molasses of sleep. Wouldn’t that be cruel, if this was all just a dream?

But then he crashes into you, this huge six-foot mass of man, toppling you directly into the marble floor. Cradled against his body, he absorbs most of the impact, but the shock jolts through you and tells you that this is real. You’re laughing—actually, you might be crying, you can’t tell—as he squeezes you so tightly into his chest it hurts. It’s never felt so good to be in pain.

“I’m home,” he whispers.

“Welcome back,” you sob in return.

The two of you stay like that for a while, completely unaware of the laughs and soft smiles you received after your little performance piece. You finally push him away to wipe tears off your cheeks, sniffling hard.

“I missed you,” you croak out, as if the words could possibly convey the depth of emotion swirling around in your heart. He nods silently, his own chestnut eyes misty. You already know that the reason he isn’t saying anything is because he doesn’t want to ugly-cry all over the place. It’s like he’d never left at all, gripping your hands. They’re huge and warm, and your shoulders melt with gratitude. You’d never forgotten this feeling after all.

Tooru wastes no more time and leans forwards, his hands catching your jaw to cradle your head. The kiss is sweet, chaste enough to not cause you shame for being in public, but passionate enough to ignite flames of desire. It’s been so long that you almost forget to react. When you do, it’s like your body moves for you, muscle memory reacting to his touch on instinct alone. He pulls away and you wished he never would.

“It looks better than I thought it would,” he mutters all of the sudden, examining something intently. You rubbed your damp eyes with your free hand and realized he was squeezing his thumb and forefinger around the ring on your left hand.

“Well, yeah. You have great taste and all. Especially since you picked _me_.”

He laughed, and you almost burst into tears again just hearing it. “I do, don’t I?”

You’re confused when he grips the ring tightly and steals it off your finger, tugging it past the knuckle. You’re both on the ground still, but he manages to prop himself up onto one knee. For a second you just stare blankly, not able to put two and two together. But then it hits you.

“Let me do it right this time.” He held the ring out between his fingers, grinning, already knowing how this would end. “[Surname] [Name]. Will you marry me?”

You have to bite your tongue as not to cry so hard you can’t answer. Faintly you heard people clapping for you, but none of them could be as happy as you. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered but him. You’d said it once and you’d say it a million times, no matter how far he was:

“Yes.”

**…now here you are.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm a sap for happy, circular endings :,) wishing you well always, mc/trashykawa. thank you for reading!

**Author's Note:**

> tumblr: https://deltachye.tumblr.com/  
> based on "two stories" by colton ez: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owwf3SbJPxc


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